But also it needs to be stable in its demands of us.”“It can’t get greedier.”“Exactly. In a way it’s a balancing act between the appeaseme...t of Rome and of Herod’s people, with Herod the central scale.”“Poor Herod. Such weight at the center.”“You are being ironic. Because of the king’s wealth.”“You’re not doing too badly either.”“You know this is the way of kings. Always. The greater the wealth, the greater the power. A meager throne is a weak throne. It represents the wealth of the kingdom. A. I tottered along much to his amusement, he pushed open the bedroom doorand I felt his hand in the small of my back propelling me into his lair.CHAPTER 4The bedroom was dimly lit with a large double bed in the middle. Upon itlay what looked like some kind of restraints with Velcro straps, aballgag and a paddle."Oh god no please no Sir," I cried in alarm. "Please Sir don't tie meand hit me."There was a slap across my bum, not overly hard but hard enough to getmy attention."I AM GOING TO FUCK YOU. Normally I’d walk around the store a bit to scope the guys buy pretending to check out what movies I might wanna’ buy, but I entered of the booths immediately. As well all know, the booths contain windows with about 2 inches of raised space at the bottom. I put a few singles into the video booth so I wouldn’t receive the typical banging on the door accompanied by ‘you must put money in!’ (in a middle eastern accent). After a few seconds of putting the money in, a long, black dick slid through. ’ She said it with pride, and it pleased him. ‘No, your family. Are you Egyptian? Greek?’ ‘Roman.’ But she said ‘Roman’ using the Greek form of the word. ‘You don’t look Roman. Ibis isn’t a Roman name.’ ‘No, it’s a whore’s name,’ she said in Greek. ‘I am Roman.’ ‘But you speak Greek,’ the Aedile said in Latin. ‘You understand Latin and speak Greek?’ ‘I prefer Greek,’ she said. Ibis was still holding her tunic up, and seemed annoyed by the conversation. The Aedile wished there were more lamps.